Status of Women in the Film Industry in India

Indian commerical cinema; traditional role of women in Masala films; rape portrayals; Indian New Cinema. Indian model of feminism.

India has the largest film industry in the world and, since 1992, one of the fastest growing television audiences in history. Popular media in India, as anywhere else, tend to reflect and shape — or attempt to shape — people’s attitudes on many issues. In the mixture of cultures, languages and religions that make up the Indian nation the status of women is a question that is capable of generating immense, furious controversy. But the question of full female emancipation, or even relatively moderate change in women’s status, is nearly taboo in the popular commercial media of film and television. Greater strides have been made since the 1980s in so-called New or parallel cinema, yet even in that arena filmmakers have strained to emphasize the nonradical, nonfeminist, tradition-oriented nature of their calls for change in women’s status. Still more…